Why deferment of Lok Sabha election in Anantnag-Rajouri has triggered controversy

Both PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti and NC vice president Omar Abdullah vehemently oppose the move and accuse ECI of dancing to the tunes of the BJP.

People watch as People’s Democratic Party chief Mehbooba Mufti, who is fighting Lok Sabha elections from Anantnag-Rajouri constituency, addresses a gathering during a roadshow in Kokernag area of south Kashmir. | Photo Credit: NISSAR AHMAD

The Election Commission of India’s (ECI) decision to defer polling in the Anantnag-Rajouri Lok Sabha seat of Jammu and Kashmir has ignited controversy.  On April 30, the ECI agreed to the demands of the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) and other regional parties to delay polling in the Anantnag-Rajouri Lok Sabha seat from May 7 to May 25 in the sixth phase of the ongoing election. This deferment of the election in the hotly contested seat has sparked resentment among the two major regional parties: Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the National Conference (NC).

The leaders of both NC and PDP, while protesting against ECI’s move in Srinagar, asked why BJP wanted this deferment when the saffron party is not contesting polls from the seat. Both PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti and NC vice president Omar Abdullah, former Chief Ministers of Jammu and Kashmir, vehemently opposed the move and accused ECI of dancing to the tunes of the BJP. 

Disenfranchising Gujjars and Bakerwals?

“There seems to be a conspiracy behind ECI’s move to delay polls because those who are not contesting elections have been demanding postponement of polls,” said Abdullah, who is NC’s candidate from north Kashmir. He added that the poll deferment is aimed to disenfranchise the nomadic Gujjar-Bakerwal population.

Gujjars and Bakerwals, who make up a significant percentage of voters in the constituency, and are the third largest community constituting 8.1 per cent of the total population of Jammu and Kashmir are about to start their annual migration to the higher pastures of the Pir Panjal mountains, casting doubts on their ability to vote.

The significant percentage of tribal voters mainly concentrated in Poonch (40.12 per cent), Rajouri (33.19 per cent) Kulgam (8.3 per cent) of the seat has prompted NC to field Mian Altaf Larvi, a Gujjar leader. The Jammu and Kashmir Apni Party, which many see as BJP’s proxy in Kashmir, fielded Zaffar Manhas, a Pahari politician, to garner support from the Pahari speaking community. 

Mian Altaf Ahmad Larvi, a Gujjar leader, is National Conference’s Lok Sabha candidate from Anantnag-Rajouri. | Photo Credit: ANI

On the other hand, Anantnag-Rajouri seat, previously known as the south Kashmir seat, was a stronghold of the PDP, which is why the party decided to field Mufti herself in the triangular contest. Mufti has asked ECI to reveal the reasons behind the postponement of elections. “A wrong report was given by the administration. Are the officers also hand in glove with the ECI?” she asked during the campaign trail in the Rajouri-Poonch belt, part of the Anantnag-Rajouri seat. 

However, the Jammu and Kashmir BJP general secretary Ashok Koul told Frontline that due to adverse weather, eight political parties approached the ECI seeking deferment of polls in the Anantnag-Rajouri seat. “Due to inclement weather the road connectivity has been disrupted in the region and so we requested ECI to delay polls.”

Besides BJP, Apni Party led by Altaf Bukhari, People’s Conference led by Imran Ansari and Democratic Progressive Azad Party (DPAP) led by Ghulam Nabi Azad, which are widely seen as the allies of the saffron party, had urged ECI to postpone the polls alleging that access to the constituency had been undermined.

Changing voter demographics

The Anantnag-Rajouri constituency, which was carved out after the Jammu and Kashmir delimitation exercise in 2022, has witnessed political drama repeatedly. The constituency, with seven Assembly segments of Rajouri and Poonch (with 7.35 lakh voters) and 11 Assembly segments of Shopian, Kulgam, Pulwama, and Anantnag (with 10.94 lakh voters, according to PDP and NC), was established to change voter demographics so that the BJP can make inroads into Muslim-dominated Valley. 

Zulfikar Ahmed Manto, district president of the Youth Congress, Poonch, attributed the postponement of the polls to the BJP’s nervousness about the response the INDIA alliance is receiving from the people. NC’s Larvi told Frontline that he has never seen elections getting postponed due to inclement weather, road block or landslides.

Mohammad Afzal, 62, a retired government employee from Poonch, claimed that there are high chances that the poll percentage will get impacted, because during the last week of May, farmers will be busy with maize cultivation, and tribal communities are expected to return to higher ranges. Sheikh Showkat Hussain, a political analyst based in Kashmir, told Frontline that the poll deferment has left people skeptical about the overall election process in the region. “First the delimitation exercise and now poll deferment have cast doubts in the minds of people. There is also a belief that tribal communities do not want the BJP and its proxies to win the Anantnag-Rajouri seat,” said Hussain.

The election commission has not yet commented on the deferment.

Irfan Amin Malik is a journalist based in Jammu and Kashmir.